


Minor Inconvenience

by diycosmology



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, typical scavengers shenanigans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-29
Updated: 2018-12-29
Packaged: 2019-09-29 19:03:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,363
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17209172
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/diycosmology/pseuds/diycosmology
Summary: Misfire, Fulcrum and Spinister go scavenging and run into some success followed by a minor inconvenience.





	Minor Inconvenience

“Why did we have to park the WAP so far from the goods…?” Misfire groaned, annoyed that he, Fulcrum and Spinister had been walking through a completely unremarkable desert for an hour and _still_ hadn’t found anything worth scavenging. He could only stare at the hills and valleys for so long before he started to get the eerie feeling that they were running around in circles. The slight overheating from the berating sun did nothing to help his mood, either.

“This planet—what is it called? Pewku IV?—is populated.” Fulcrum said. He had to wonder if Misfire would have been less obnoxious if Krok and Crankcase had joined them instead of staying behind to repair the ship and keep an eye on Grimlock. “Not necessarily _here_ , but it gets more and more likely the closer we are to our destination, and the last thing we want is trouble.”

“Can we at least fly?” Misfire held his arms and spun around, unintentionally mimicking an aileron roll, which he really wished he could have been doing just then. “Walking is _bo-ring._ ”

“Walking is _fuel-efficent_.”

Misfire’s twirl reoriented him so he was walking backwards while Fulcrum and Spinister were still moving forwards. “We ate before we left! And we’ll probably find energon when we get there! C’mon, Fulc, this is so boring I think I’m gonna die and you wouldn’t want to deal with my corpse. At least I hope you wouldn’t. Actually, I take that back, If I die you better use me for spare parts. But I hope I don’t die. But I’m _going to_ if we keep this up—”

“Will you stop complaining?” Fulcrum crossed his arms and rolled his eyes in a single motion. “It gets kind of old after an hour.”

“Yes.” Misfire spoke without thinking and corrected himself after giving it a second of thought. “Maybe. No guarantees.”

Fulcrum sighed and signaled for Spinister to give him a lift. He tended to prefer getting carted around by Spinister, because Misfire had a habit of doing tricks mid-air to keep himself interested, which was great when he was on his own—spectacular, even, for an onlooker, but terrifying when he had a guest.

“Yay!” Misfire turned and sprinted ahead, launching himself off a nearby cliff and flying off into the distance, which was just as bland out there as it was where he started. Spinister hovered above Fulcrum who took hold of his passenger handle. They eventually caught up with Misfire, who they found lying on the outskirts of some settlement—hard to miss when there was nothing else around, thankfully. He was laying on his back, arms behind his head, staring at the clouds above. “Finally! Took you guys long enough...the idea was to speed things up, you know.”

“You _know_ that your top speed is practically five times Spinister’s.” Fulcrum shook his head. “Did you check this place out? It looks like it’s the Decepticon base Krok picked up on while he was watching the radar.”

“Just through binoculars, but yep. Definitely Cybertronian. Which is good, cause now I’m starving.”

“Let’s check it out.” Fulcrum waved for them to follow as he approached it.

It was much darker and cooler inside, a welcome contrast to the outdoors. Cybertronians weren’t susceptible to any sort of health problems at the temperature they had been facing, but it was still enough to be irritating. The place was in total disrepair, though every other computer monitor embedded into the wall still flickered as they held desperately onto their last reserves of power. The surfaces and floor were completely littered, making it impossible to tell what was trash and what was treasure without close inspection. While Fulcrum rummaged through drawers and Spinister traced the wires hung along the ceiling, Misfire struck up a conversation with the non sentient AI that used to control the bases’ automatic functions. He _said_ that he was trying to see if he could get any useful information out of it, but was obviously assessing if it had learned a good sense of humor in its Cyberforming days.

After noticing Fulcrum picking through the rubble to look for energon, Spinister followed his example. When Misfire realized he was the only one goofing off, he bid farewell to the AI and started searching too. Fulcrum stayed behind to complete his thorough investigation of the main room while Spinister and Misfire teamed up to explore a hallway. They came back a few minutes later.

“Spin found something!” Misfire said, about to drop an armful of liquid energon rations in the middle of the room.

“Wh—don’t drop it! Energon is explosive!” Fulcrum gasped.

“What, afraid of a little boom?” Misfire cackled as he set them down gently and made no effort to contain them as they all rolled away. “Excuse us for being helpful and actually finding what we came for.” He rose back to his full height and crossed his arms, full of unwarranted pride. “Unlike _some_ people.”

“’ _Us_ ’? Sounds like you’re piggybacking on Spinister’s success. And besides, it’s not like I wasn’t trying.”

“Oh, I know. You’re a total tryhard.”

After a while the group of three had gotten their grimy hands on a satisfying amount of long expired energon. Or at least Fulcrum and Spinister did. Misfire had plenty of fun loathing his lack of success. They stuffed their bounty in a large metal box found onsite and Misfire managed to convince Spinister to carry it after “proving” that it was too heavy for him and Fulcrum, not that either of them were particularity convincing actors, but Spinister fell for it anyways. When they exited the abandoned Decepticon outpost they were greeted by an all-consuming shadow cast by a tall, massive, looming black cube, its size and darkness almost completely absorbing the harsh sunlight.

“What the hell?” Misfire squeaked, hiding behind Spinister. “That wasn’t here before!”

“What wasn’t?!” Spinister looked around in a panic. He spotted it, pulled out his hand gun and shot it relentlessly.

“Whoa whoa _whoa_! Put that thing away!” Misfire batted for Spinister to put his arm down. “It’s okay, Spin, it’s not going to do anything. It’s just a...a monolith, I guess. It’s just gonna sit there… all… menacing-like. Yeesh, I can see why you don’t like this thing.” Misfire’s commanding pats turned into comforting ones as Spinister surrendered, putting his gun back in his hip pocket. Misfire turned to Fulcrum. “This is probably bad, though, right? Any idea what the hell’s going on?”

Fulcrum stoked his achingly handsome chin while he compiled everything he knew and could assume about the situation. “This place is a Cyberforming station. I was out of action for a couple million years, and it’s a little unfamiliar to me, so I have to assume it’s a newer model...”

“What? How can you be sure?”

“I was a Cyberforming manager. I told you this already!”

“You did?” Misfire tapped his chin, trying to remember. “Huh. Well I clearly wasn’t listening.”

“Clearly. Anyways, organics developed this technology to deter us, these phobia shields. They project our worst fears in a tangible form. And since this place seems more up-to-date than what I know, it might be too, so we could be dealing with anything. But before take any action, Spinister...”

Spinister turned his attention from the anomaly back to the conversation when Misfire gave him a tug on the arm.

“Spinister.” Fulcrum pointed upwards at the stories-high brick before them. “Would you consider...monoliths...your biggest fear?”

Spinister nodded.

“Shit.” Misfire shook his head.

“This could get real ugly, real fast. We need to be prepared.” Fulcrum turned towards Misfire and straightened out his body language in hopes he’d listen to someone with good posture. “What’s your worst fear?”

“Haha! Nice try. You first.”

“Okay, fair. I guess… if I had to pick…” Fulcrum’s gaze was glued to the ground as he trudged through the depths of his consciousness for the answer. “I guess getting tortured is big on my list.”

“Makes sense. Torture sucks.” Spinister nodded knowingly.

“Okay, me next! Remember the whole ‘misfire’ incident?”

“You only talk about it all the time.”

“Yeah, well, I think that’s retroactively become my biggest fear. So I guess don’t give me a gun?”

“I would never.” Fulcrum smiled. “Alright, that’s settled. Let’s get out of here.”

“Don’t mind if I do…” Misfire started to transform, but Fulcrum stopped him before he could finish.

“What do you think you’re doing?! Spinister can’t fly, he has to carry the stuff!”

“ _You_ could carry the stuff.” Misfire said, still half-folded and ready to pounce.

“And walk to the ship while you two fly off without me?”

“We could… uh…” Misfire fully reverted back to his first form and put on his best thinking face, rubbing his unhinged and slightly askew jaw as if leaving his mouth wide open would encourage the good ideas to flow freely. “We could tie the box to Spin’s handles and I could carry you?”

“…There _were_ a ton of heavy-duty computing cables in the outpost, actually. That’s worth a try.” Fulcrum shrugged.

They went back inside and rummaged around the wreckage, Misfire comically unable to pull the cables from their sockets until Fulcrum intervened to point out the very obvious lock tabs that needed to be switched off. They secured the box to Spinister and after a few hundred foot test flight decided the cables were strong enough to carry their loot home.

“Okay, let’s go.” Fulcrum said, putting on his goggles and grabbing on to Misfire’s handle before the jet transformed. “But—listen. Are you listening?”

“Yep!” Misfire nodded enthusiastically.

“This place is _dangerous_. It’s absolutely _imperative_ that we stick together. Spinister can’t keep up if you go more than two hundred miles an hour.”

“Ugh!” Misfire moaned, stomping his boot in frustration. “That _sucks_. That’s practically walking.”

“ _Misfire_.” Fulcrum growled and shook his handle to emphasize how serious he was about the matter. “And while I’m at it, no tricks either.”

“Fine! 10-4! Whatever!” Misfire transformed and took off without any warning just to mess with Fulcrum, who rightfully screamed for his life. That moment of terror made the whole flight worth it. They caught up with Spinister and made the return trip to the ship without incident, even managing to have some pleasant conversation on the way.

“…Huh. That was suspiciously without incident.” Fulcrum said as the trio came in for a landing. He was so sure he’d be safe and have a good window to bail considering he’d seen Misfire make graceful landings with and without passengers a million times, and there were no obstacles to get in their way. Instead Misfire crashed both of them into the ground, kicking up dirty desert dust as they dislodged it. Fulcrum was at first thankful that he seemed relatively undamaged by the occurrence, and then thankful that he’d been wearing his goggles, since he could only imagine how irritating getting a grain of sand or tiny clump of dirt lodged underneath your optics must be. He spoke as Misfire transformed. “Okay, maybe _that_ was our inevitable incident. But it still feels like we got off too easy…”

“What, you _want_ _ed_ to get gunned down by yours truly or have your eyeballs melted or something?” Misfire mimed his eyes melting down his face by dragging his fingers down his cheeks and then got up, inspecting the new direction his tails were bent.

“No, now I’m just worried that something worse is around the corner.” Fulcrum said as he wiped cakes of dirt off of himself.

“Makes sense coming from you, you coward.” Misfire stuck his tongue out as he approached the ship and tried to slap the palm reader to open the door. Fulcrum climbed up the hovering Spinister’s cargo, held on to one of his handles with one hand, and used his other to saw the cables apart with a knife. It took a while before their haul was cut loose and he and Spinister were both free to put their boots on the ground. The entire time, Misfire hadn’t stopped furiously slapping the ship, and every attempt had been met with an error tone.

“What’s up?” Fulcrum asked as he put his goggles back on top of his helmet, concerned.

“It! Won’t! Open!” Misfire whined and applied more strength with every hit. If he were to be left uninterrupted, the touchpad would be destroyed soon enough.

Fulcrum brushed Misfire aside with confidence that it would recognize him, which it didn’t. They got Spinister to try and that failed too.

“Okay, add  _that_ to the repairs list…” Fulcrum sighed,  flipping his communicator  open so he could call Krok and ask for him to open the ship from the inside. The call went through, but  they received only static . “That too, apparently. Ugh. Misfire?”

Misfire called and got the same result. “What the hell? How are we supposed to get in there?” He put his fists on his hips, looking over the ship’s exterior. “I guess we could break a window open?”

“No. This ship’s in enough di s repair as it is.  We don’t need to be inviting whatever space debris inside too. ”

“ Then let’s hear your idea.”

“I… don’t have one. But good ideas take time, and we’ve got enough fuel to last us a looong time.” Fulcrum pointed over his shoulder with his thumb to their energon haul.

“Yeah, as long as Cranky doesn’t convince Krok that marooning us is the right thing to do.” Misfire laughed, trying to distract himself from the reality of the situation. He failed. “Ugh. Fine. Let’s have a frikkin’ sit down about this.”

“…By which he means calmly asses the situation until we reach a logical conclusion. Come here, Spinister.” Fulcrum invited him over and they took seats on either side of Misfire. “So. What we know is…”

“The phobia shield is working. We’ve only seen Spin’s fear so far, though.”

“…But you have to admit that the ship and the phones not working is pretty  anomalous …”

“So?”

“So, all I’m saying is, are you sure you were _completely_ honest with yourself?”

“ Oh, what, this is  _my_ fault?!”  Misfire scoffed, turning his head away from Fulcrum in defiance.

“I’m _just_ saying, all signs point to this being _one_ of our faults, and it seems pretty far from torture.”

“Oh yeah? Cause it sure _feels_ like torture. Maybe the shield just decided to take a more metaphorical approach.”

“Could you please stop with the ticking?” Spinister interrupted. “It’s driving me nuts.”

“Ticking…?” Fulcrum tuned in to the barely audible sound once it had been pointed out and looked around for the source. “How long has that been happening?”

“Since we got here.”

“How did none of us notice?!” Fulcrum asked, dumbfounded and still scanning.

“Misfire doesn’t usually notice small stuff like that and you have hearing loss from your K-Class buddies going off.” Spinister shrugged.

Fulcrum smiled at the notion that any of those strangers qualified as his ‘buddies’. “ _Right_. It’s surprisingly easy to forget about that. But when did you notice it, Spinister?”

“When it started, but I was trying really hard to not be rude.”

“You _really_ should mention stuff like that. This predicament is an excellent example of _why_.” Misfire said as he got up to investigate. After walking a little ways away, he came back and bent down to put his head next to Fulcrum’s chest. “It’s coming from you.”

“ _What_!” Fulcrum jumped back as if there was an unwelcome insect on him.

Misfire counted out their newly updated clues on his fingers. “Phobia shield’s working, ship isn’t, phones aren’t, Fulcrum’s ticking. I don’t know, Fulc, this kinda seems like it’s your fault now.”

“Stop it.” Fulcrum insisted, trying  his best to  not panic. “Do you know why  someone who turns into a  _bomb_ would be  _ticking_ ?”

“Cause you’re about to…” Misfire frowned. “Oh.”

“What?” Spinister asked.

“He’s about to detonate.”

“ Oh,  okay. ” Spinister  took his emergency medical toolkit out of his hip pocket. “Lie down.”

Fulcrum did just that and waited for Spinister to work his magic.  His payload was different this time —like something out of  an action movie, with a timer and mess of  color coded  wires. 

Misfire crawled over to sneak a peek.  “ Whoa. That looks way different from last time.”

Fulcrum groaned. “It’s just—you know. The image of a payload in my mind. I’m not  an expert on the subject.”

Misfire loomed over Fulcrum, reading the countdown out loud,  which was  just as calming a s it was  stressful . Despite the slight setback, Spinister still defused  Fulcrum flawlessly with a minute and a half left on the clock.

Tick. Tick. Tick.

“What?! Why didn’t that work?” Misfire whined in frustration, then confusion. He rose to a kneel, expecting eye contact with Spinister to somehow explain everything. “And if it didn’t work, why didn’t it explode?”

“Yeah, what?” Spinister squinted, unknowingly rejecting Misfire’s attempt at eye contact, looking to see if anything about Fulcrum’s internal arrangement was different.

“Misfire, listen… what are you afraid of?”

“I told you!” Misfire got up and threw his arms down, annoyed that Fulcrum was pressing him for an answer he’d already provided. He started to walk off, not that he knew where he was going.

“Really think, please. Take this very seriously. It’s _kind of_ life or death.”

Misfire groaned and collapsed to the ground, squatting and cradling his face in his hands, this time shy to let the others observe the visual aspect of his thought process. His wings flapped idly in time with Fulcrum’s ticking as he really crunched the numbers. “I, um...” He folded his hands over his knees. “Failure?”

Fulcrum’s face lit up. “Yes, yes, that’s got to be it!  You failed to find anything at the base, y our landing failed, t he palm reader failed, the calls failed, Spinister failed!  Everything you pa i d attention to failed.  See what happens when you’re honest?”

Misfire got up just to cross his arms in annoyance. “Uh, excuse me, you lied too. Torture my ass. You’re afraid of detonating! That’s why you didn’t transform when they flung you out of the drop ship.”

“ You  _were_ listening to my backstory…?” Fulcrum smiled before remembering their urgent situation. “ And I didn’t  _lie_ , I said  _torture’s big on my list._ Not as big as combusting to death,  clearly . But whatever , be mad at me later.”  He waved dismissively. “Right now we’ve got some serious problem solving to do.”

“Right. Fine. How are we going to get out of this one, fearless leader?”

Fulcrum stood up to be level with Misfire. Spinister stayed kneeling, which just so happened to make him level, too.  “Well, it seems like these  _are_ newer phobia shields, since  the ones I knew couldn’t manifest more than one fear at a time. But knowing organics, they probably weren’t  _too_ innovative. I bet they can still only feed off a  _conscious_ mind.  If who they were  feeding off were to go offline, the projection from that person would stop too. ”

“So… you’re saying…”

“We need to be unconscious. Well, probably only Misfire does, but better safe than sorry. Spinister?” Fulcrum pointed at him with a posture entirely too valiant for what they were about to do.

Spinister nodded once. He was listening.

“Knock us out, then call Krok and ask him to open the door.” A _little_ bit over excited, Fulcrum accidentally omitted that Spinister should also explain why they needed the door to be opened, or to not freak out when two thirds of the party had been knocked out by the other.

Spinister rose to his full, intimidating height and nodded again, priming his hands for impact.

Misfire managed to squeeze in one last sentence. “I’m not sure I like this plan—!”

⁂

Krok and Crankcase opened the door the other Scavengers were waiting outside  of , greeted by Spinister and his two  unconscious  comrades,  one with an exposed chest and both with over sized knuckle prints in d en t ed into their face plates.

Crankcase shook his head. “I always knew this would happen.”


End file.
